


Screams of Long Dead Creatures

by mamdible



Category: Pocket Monsters: Sword & Shield | Pokemon Sword & Shield Versions
Genre: F/F, Gen, Ghost-type Pokemon, Horror, Psychological Horror
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-26
Updated: 2020-03-25
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:01:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23320609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mamdible/pseuds/mamdible
Summary: Sometimes things don't die properly. Sometimes they leave parts behind, enough that those slivers of what was once alive can shamble on, walking the earth in hopes of finding prey. And Pokemon trainers will catch these collections of regrets and ectoplasm and will give these ghosts and ghouls company, attention, and targets for the frustrated violence collecting in their souls.A collection of every encounter Pokemon Trainer Gloria has with Ghost-type Pokemon, during the gym challenge and after her ascension as Champion.
Relationships: Mary | Marnie/Yuuri | Gloria
Kudos: 20





	Screams of Long Dead Creatures

She encounters the Pokemon not in the tall grass, but when visiting her Grandmother’s house. Ever since she became a trainer, it’s been a little bit harder to make time for family; her mother has become a distant figure, waving from the stands at battles and singing her happy birthday (if scheduling allows for time off for such things like thirteenth, then fourteenth birthdays, and she’s nearly fifteen now).

But Gran’s health has been failing, these days, hands shaking on her cane and eyes blurred. So she takes time out of her schedule as champion to visit, ignores her agents and managers fussing and pulling her this way and that, and just goes back to Postwick.

It’s not even a town – just a cluster of houses near the Weald, far enough away to warrant a new name, but not far enough or important enough to deserve a train station. That’s reserved for Wedgehurst, which gets all the fame, even though two Pokemon trainers have been born in Postwick, now.

Postwick is like an old shirt that doesn’t quite fit right, anymore. It’s nostalgia and childhood and happy memories free from the fear of battles, of the wilderness and Pokemon hunting, but she’s tall now. She sees things from a different perspective, ever since her last growth spurt, and everything just seems a little… off. 

Gran’s house is just one winding path down from the main ‘road’ (a dirt path), and Mum visits every afternoon, but this time she had to go into Wedgehurst for her doctor’s appointment, so it falls to her to take care of Gran.

Her name was Chiara, once. She was a Pokemon trainer too, back when Pokeballs were clunky and had wires fitted around the inside, weren’t all wireless and virtual. She caught one hundred and seventy two Pokemon, though the only one she seemed attached to was her Eldegoss, named ‘Angie’. The rest weren’t named, were traded and sold for her retirement, and she managed to quit working when she was fifty two, with enough money to buy a house for herself out in Postwick, and then she had Mum.

That’s all Gloria knows about Gran. She’s an old woman, now. Her skin is leathery and wrinkled, eyes drooping. Photos on her mantle display a young woman, grinning ear to ear, with a skinny young man tucked awkwardly under her arm, blushing. Real life has only an old woman, with a bittersweet smile, lonely in her house.

“Gran?”

The house has an overgrown garden, with flowering vines everywhere, and cotton plants dotting the house. Budews scurry in and out of the dirt, keeping close to their spawning plants. Some Gossifleurs are rooted firmly in the ground, uncaring of anything but the sun.

“Gran, you in?”

She steps through the doorway, shoes creaking against the floorboards. It’s an old house, but a good one. Old-fashioned furniture, heirlooms dotted here and there in cupboards and on walls. Usually, Gran’ll be in the kitchen, sipping a cup of Roseli berry tea and looking at the photo on the mantle above the stove.

“Hey, Gran, it’s me, Gloria.”

The house is eerily quiet. Gloria walks a little further, and finds Gran’s old worn mug sitting on the countertop of the kitchen. The purple tea is Gran’s favourite blend – sweet and fragrant, with a sour aftertaste. Her mug is a pale blue – ‘authentic’, Gran said, but who knows – and chipped, with only half a handle. Usually it’s cradled in her hand, but now it sits, cold and abandoned.

“Gran! This isn’t funny!”

God, she sounds like a kid again. Like when she was twelve, and there was battle after battle, a gauntlet of training and fighting and not eating enough or well, of cooking food in a never-quite-clean pot over a fire, of throwing in whatever berries and ingredients she could find in the wild and from peddlers. 

The tea moves. It ripples, actually, a yellow sheen mixing with the purple, and a careful tendril of cold tea grips the broken handle. Along the chipped rim, the tea spills a bit, but manages to keep itself steady. It rises, floating up, and over to her.

She’s heard of this – cold, abandoned tea, and restless spirits of those who are lonely and equally cold, a Pokemon called ‘Polteageist’. Different kinds of tea, different cups, always different, but the species is common enough. There are a lot of lonely spirits, and a lot of lonely cups of tea.

Gloria knows what this means. She knows that if she goes upstairs, Gran will be – in her bed, on the floor, in a chair – and she will be dead. And she will have to find the body, and call the ambulance, and tell Mum. But this is first. This is important.

The Pokeball is one of the older models; same ones that Gran used. She tosses it without weakening the Pokemon, because if Gran doesn’t want this, if her spirit just wants to die and go on, she shan’t try to keep her alive in any form.

But the Polteageist barely rocks the ball, just stays quiet inside the red and white ball. Her Rotom beeps out a chirpy message – Congratulations, you have caught ‘Polteageist’, your Pokedex has been expanded – would you like to give your Polteageist a nickname?

“Chiara,” she whispers, but the Rotom picks it up anyway. 

‘Where shall you send Chiara to?”

And she can’t deal with this, not right now, and so she whispers “Box”, almost guiltily, but she tells herself she’ll give Chiara to Mum, and Mum will look after her. It’s temporary.

For now, she has something to – to deal with.


End file.
